![\"May](\"http:\/\/stacy.awegallery.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/06\/May-5-Star-Anemone-WEB.jpg\")
<\/a>Each beach and cove is uniquely carved by the tides.\u00c2\u00a0 Two times a day the tides rise and fall revealing the enormous ocean diversity just a few feet beyond our usual vista.\u00c2\u00a0 How powerful the ocean proves to be as it moves around all that water tugged by the moon and sun.<\/p>\nThe lowest tides locally are anywhere between a negative foot or two.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 The most dramatic sea level change on the West Coast is Puget Sound, Washington with up to 20 feet difference between the highest and lowest tides.<\/p>\n
Finding and framing your subject is perhaps the most important aspect of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153on the rocks\u00e2\u20ac\u009d photography.\u00c2\u00a0 With smaller subjects it is easy to control your light with diffusers and reflectors.\u00c2\u00a0 Fortunately, many mornings on the coast are cast in fog providing a wonderful even light which teases out the vibrancy of intertidal zone colors.<\/p>\n
Every time I walk on the mussel or seaweed covered rock-shelves and accidentally step on a closed or hidden anemone it squirts up a stream of water reminding me I have wounded it.\u00c2\u00a0 I try to ask of it forgiveness and promise to be more careful.<\/p>\n
These days I think we need to ask the earth at many levels for forgiveness as we promise to do better at not wounding, destroying and poisoning it. For me every dramatic landscape image or small detail shot moves me not just to awe at its beauty but heightens my consciousness for its preservation.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 I hope some of the images I share with you in these blog pages and portfolios will bring the same challenge to your thoughtfulness.<\/p>\n
\u00e2\u20ac\u0153Congress has exempted fracking from the Safe Drinking Water Act and aspects of the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 The committee set up to study the issue doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t include a single medical expert.\u00c2\u00a0 The results of the first epidemiological study to determine water quality and the health of people near fracking operations are still 18 months out.\u00c2\u00a0 Thank you Vermont, for being the first state to ban hydraulic fracturing outright!<\/p>\n We need energy and we need jobs but we also need our Mother Earth as whole and well as possible!\u00c2\u00a0 Our health depends on hers.\u00c2\u00a0 We can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t keep stepping on her and asking for her forgiveness without amending our practices and polices.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" On the rocks may be the way to order your Long Island ice tea or scotch, but for me that is my low tide mantra. Ochre Sea Stars, Blue Mussels, Keyhole Limpets, Giant Green Anemone, Nuttall\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Chiton, Goose and Leaf … Continue reading <\/a>Rebecca Clarren, in the Spring MS Magazine<\/em>, wrote a provocative, articulate and well researched article: \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Fracking is a Feminist Issue.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d\u00c2\u00a0 We need to be aware and educated about the affects of natural-gas drilling, with the injection of thousands of chemicals into the ground, on the health of the earth and each of us.\u00c2\u00a0 There are no environmental safeguards set in place.<\/p>\n